Introduction

During the month of October I'm going through Mexico's National Archives (AGN) in Mexico City to recover original Spanish documents not possessed by UWF, in particular those relevant to my thesis research into frontier manifestations and negotiations of Spanish, French, and Apalachee identity. Specifically, I hope to identify exactly how French and Spanish colonial societies differed and how those differences affected groups of Apalachee Indians allied with French Mobile and Spanish Pensacola.

The AGN to me seems an under-utilized resource for my and other projects relating to Spanish Pensacola. Historians, with some exceptions, focus their work on the Archive of the Indies (AGI), where extensive summaries and occasionally copies of material relating to all Spanish colonies ended up. The AGN instead only possesses material generated in or sent to New Spain, but the actual documents rather than summaries, so any non-religious correspondence relating to Pensacola should be there. St. Augustine had closer ties to Cuba, which also headed Franciscan efforts in Spanish Florida.

British-sponsored attacks on Florida destroyed the Apalachee province in 1704-- these Indians fled to Pensacola, St. Augustine, the Creek Indians, or French Mobile. After that point, Spaniards attempted to reconnect St. Augustine and Pensacola with very limited success. People moved between the two towns, but military personnel in Pensacola had more in common with the Presidio of Carmen in Campeche, Mexico after that garrison's 1717 reestablishment. A large group of Apalachee felt safer being among a dozen French-allied Native American groups but those that settled near Pensacola were tempted by Spanish rations, gifts, titles, and Catholicism.

Check back for updates regarding my research, as well as posts about Mexico City archaeology, history, and anything that strikes me as interesting.